1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a bottling plant with sections for stabilizing bottled products in containers.
2. Background Information
In the beverage industry, in particular when products being bottled are easily perishable, it is common practice to heat-stabilize the products. In bottling plants of the known art, the containers that contain the products are transported in a practically uniform movement from the entry of the plant to the exit from the plant. As they move through the plant, they are heated until they have achieved the required degree of heat-stabilization and are then cooled, whereupon the heat-stabilizing process is completed. A heat-stabilizing tunnel provided for this purpose consequently has a heating section, a superheating and heat-stabilizing section, and a final cooling section. The individual sections can have additional sub-zones. The gradual heating and cooling that such an arrangement provides is preferred, in particular for the glass bottles used in the beverage industry, to prevent any destruction of the glass bottles caused by abrupt temperature changes. The transmission of heat to the product in the containers normally occurs by spraying these containers with water as they are advanced on a conveyor belt which allows the liquid to be sprayed from underneath. Underneath the conveyor belt are catch basins for the sprayed liquid from which the pumps for the spraying are fed. Heat can be exchanged by means of the spray liquid zone-wise between the zones to be heated and the zones to be cooled.
In at least one possible embodiment of the present invention, the containers to be heat-stabilized and the heat-stabilized containers preferably are bottles.
To achieve an optimal graduation of the temperatures in the individual sections, the sections are subdivided into individual zones. Generally, the heating section has three to four individual zones, the heat-stabilizing section has two or three zones, and there can be an additional superheating zone upstream of the heat-stabilizing zone. The following cooling section in turn has three to four individual zones, in which the containers are cooled by reducing the temperature of the spraying liquid in steps until the containers reach the desired output temperature.
To guarantee that the product in the containers achieves the specified degree of heat-stabilization, the individual spraying temperatures set must be adapted to the following factors, for example: the product, the length of the zones, and the speed of the conveyor belt.
Because such a heat-stabilization system is installed as part of a more comprehensive bottling plant and represents only a portion of this bottling plant, disruptions in the continuous feed of the containers, i.e., an interruption in the flow of containers, or disruptions in the removal of the containers, i.e., a production stoppage, can occur more or less frequently. The result of a production stoppage is that the taste of the products that are currently being held at the heat stabilization temperature can be adversely affected by excessive heat stabilization.
If there is an interruption in the container flow or if the plant runs empty, the thermal equilibrium between the products being heated and the products being cooled is disrupted so that initially the products leave the plant at an excessive temperature, later the heat-stabilized products are no longer cooled quickly enough, and finally the products that enter the heat-stabilizing section are no longer at the required heat stabilization temperature.
In other words, in known heat stabilizing systems, if there is an interruption in the container flow or if the heat stabilization or bottling plant runs empty, the thermal equilibrium between the products being heated and the products being cooled may be disrupted. As a result of such disruption, containers that enter the heat stabilizing section may not be at the required pasteurization temperature. These containers may not be cooled quickly enough after heat stabilization and therefore may leave the plant at an excessive temperature.
The consequences of the type of production disruption described above can be prevented by the controlled addition or removal of thermal energy. Generally, either heat is added to the process indirectly by means of heat exchangers or hot water is added directly from a central heat source and returned at a colder temperature. The removal of heat from the process is realized, as in the known art, by the addition of cold liquid, which is then removed at a higher temperature.
One object of the present invention may be to propose a method for the operation of such a bottling plant in which the response to disruptions in the container flow can be managed in an essentially optimum fashion with an essentially minimized utilization of the resources water and heat.
One characteristic of the process may be that each addition of heat required for regulation of the process may be followed after some delay by the removal of heat (and vice versa) on the same order of magnitude. In this regard, the teachings concerning the storage of the heat are described in some publications.
One disadvantage of the methods described in some publications, however, is that as a result of the collection of the liquid overflowing from the plant in a conduit or in a plurality of reservoirs, a mixing of the temperatures takes place so that the resulting temperature of the fluid in the reservoir cannot be used either for controlled cooling or for controlled heating. An additional disadvantage is that although heat is stored on a low temperature level, the liquid in question cannot be used for cooling, i.e., there is no conservation of water.
At least one possible embodiment of the present invention preferably teaches that to eliminate these disadvantages, the excess liquid in the heating section added by the regulation process to the zones in the method overflows in a cascade fashion from zone to zone of increasing overflow temperature; in the cooling section, overflows in cascade fashion from zone to zone of decreasing overflow temperature; from the last zone, i.e, the hottest zone in the heating section, overflows into an essentially warm liquid reservoir or tank 13; and from the coldest zone, position, or tank 10 in the cooling section, overflows into an essentially cold liquid reservoir or tank 14. Also, to eliminate the disadvantages of the known art, at least one possible embodiment of the present invention preferably teaches that the excess fluid added by the regulation process to the heat stabilizing section overflows from the zones into an essentially hot liquid reservoir 15.
In an independent realization of the invention, the liquid contained in the cold liquid reservoir 14 can be forcibly transported and used in a controlled fashion to cool at least the zones or tanks in the cooling section and in the heat stabilizing section; the liquid contained in the warm liquid reservoir 13 can be forcibly transported and used in a controlled fashion to heat at least the zones or tanks in the heating section or to cool the zones or tanks in the heat-stabilizing section; and the liquid in the hot liquid reservoir, after the addition of thermal energy, can be used in a controlled fashion to heat at least the zones or tanks in the heat stabilizing section.
As a result of the use of at least one possible embodiment of the present invention, the cold water in the initial portion of the heating section may be essentially gradually heated to the respective higher operating temperatures of the subsequent zones, and the water injected into the cooling section is in turn cooled down essentially gradually, as a function of the individual zones, which may lead to a particularly efficient use of energy. Additionally, when there is a disruption in the feed of the containers to be heat-stabilized, the quantity of water currently in the containers can be used for an essentially rapid cooling of the critical zones, as well as for an essentially rapid heating of these zones and the additional zones, as a result of which the consumption of fresh water can be reduced significantly.
In other words, in at least one possible embodiment of the present invention, water or other liquid, even in the event of a stoppage, interruption, or emptying of the bottling plant or heat stabilizing system, preferably is recycled from the cooling section to the heating section, for example, and vice versa. Also, in at least one possible embodiment of the present invention, water or other liquid, even in the event of a stoppage, interruption, or emptying of the bottling plant or heat stabilizing system, is maintained at an essentially constant temperature by means of tanks or reservoirs that may be centrally located in the bottling plant or heat stabilizing system.
The embodiments of the present invention discussed herein will be described further herein with reference to the accompanying figures. When the word xe2x80x9cinventionxe2x80x9d is used in this specification, the word xe2x80x9cinventionxe2x80x9d includes xe2x80x9cinventionsxe2x80x9d, that is, the plural of xe2x80x9cinventionxe2x80x9d. By stating xe2x80x9cinventionxe2x80x9d, Applicants do not in any way admit that the present application does not include more than one patentably and non-obviously distinct invention, and maintain that this application may include more than one patentably and non-obviously distinct invention. Applicants hereby assert that the disclosure of this application may include more than one invention, and, in the event that there is more than one invention, that these inventions may be patentable and non-obvious one with respect to the other.